USA > Ohio > Women of Ohio; a record of their achievements in the history of the state, Volume II > Part 27
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The drug store was remodeled. Cora presently got a larger store started on Race Street near Seventh. It was in this location she really began her remarkable career. Old show cases were remodeled, old shelves were replaced with others-the best that money could buy.
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It was one of the first, if not the first drug store in the United States, to embody the modern conceptions of service and store management. The fame of this store, lavishly decorated with marble and stained glass and bright- ened with fresh merchandise, spread all over the country. Its success encour- aged Miss Dow to install her own plant for the manufacture of ice cream, and gradually to enlarge the sphere of her activities until eleven Dow drug stores and a great wholesale plant at 9th and Broadway exercised a dominating influence in the drug business throughout the country.
One of the secrets of Miss Dow's success was her almost uncanny capacity for insight into personal character. Guided by this faculty she surrounded herself with more than 200 employees, everyone of whom was loyal to the employer and her ideals, and everyone of whom she respects as a personal friend. It was one of the stipulations under which Miss Dow finally sold her business just before her death that the welfare of those whose loyal cooperation made her success possible should be safe-guarded by the new management. So practically the entire personnel of the Dow organization was continued in the employment of the re-organized company.
In spite of the tremendous responsibility of her business and the limita- tions of a naturally frail body, Miss Dow always found time and energy for philanthropic and altruistic work. She was a friend and patron to aspiring young men and women whose education she made possible by generous finan- cial aid and to the upbuilding of whose moral character she gave unsparingly of her own encouragement and influence.
Her work on behalf of humane legislation for the protection of horses and dogs was eloquent testimony to the gentleness and sympathy of her own heart.
It has been estimated that Cora Dow amassed $1,000,000 through her own endeavors.
She was also a woman of fine musical ability. This talent she cultivated even while working to become a druggist. Almost to the end, even while suffering great pain, her interest in musical matters did not slacken, and by her will left the bulk of her estate to the orchestra she loved. But she also left bequests to virtually all of her employees.
When Cora Dow realized that death was a matter of days with her, she issued a farewell note to her employees. She wished them to stay with the new organization and said, "All I ask of each of you is that he do his work the best he can and give the new organization the same fidelity, effort and loyalty that have been mine for so many years. And from me, as long as I live, you will have an abiding affection. God bless everyone of you."
This was the benediction of Cora Dow for those who had helped her mount the ladder of success.
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CARRIE RITTENHOUSE FAULKNER
Whether in business or in public office CARRIE RITTENHOUSE FAULK- NER has proven both her ability and her adaptability, being ready for any emergency or any opportunity. She is the wife of Amos E. Faulkner and when her husband's health failed she looked about to find some way of meeting the situation which confronted her, with the result that she is now proprietor and manager of Mrs. Faulkner's Beauty Studio, one of the finest establishments of the kind not only in Xenia, but in all Ohio. She also has important public service to her credit, having served as county treasurer.
Mrs. Faulkner was born in Clinton County, Ohio, a daughter of Omer and Jennie (O'Day) Rittenhouse, the mother born in August, 1863. The father, who was born in April, 1844, was of German and English descent. One of the uncles in the paternal line was Benjamin Wilson, who at one time was governor of West Virginia and was also United States Senator.
Mrs. Faulkner pursued her high school studies at Washington Court- house, Ohio, and is a graduate of Drury College of Springfield, Missouri, where she won a business degree. She was but four years of age when her parents removed to Kansas and secured a ranch on the boundary of what was then the Indian Territory but is now Oklahoma. There she spent her early girlhood and her playmates were the little Cherokee Indian children who lived on the reservation near the Rittenhouse home. After completing her studies she taught school for five years in Ohio and West Virginia, becom- ing a teacher in the Seventh Baptist College at Salem, West Virginia. She afterward was married in 1901 to Amos E. Faulkner of Xenia, Ohio, and for a time engaged in business with her husband at Paintersville, this state, where they had a general merchandise store. They next removed to Xenia, where Mr. Faulkner became county auditor and Mrs. Faulkner assisted him as second deputy auditor from 1914 to 1919. She now owns the Mrs. Faulkner's Beauty Studio, which she established in 1932, after taking a course in the Marinello Beauty College at Cincinnati. She won the highest honors at her graduation and she is licensed both in Ohio and Florida. This undertaking was started because Mr. Faulkner's health failed and he had to give up active business. She has built up one of the best known beauty studios in this and surrounding counties and the business has been a profitable one almost from the beginning.
In the meantime Mrs. Faulkner had served as county treasurer, having been appointed to fill out an unexpired term, after which she was elected for the short term, which gave her three tax settlement periods while filling that position. She was one of the first women in the entire United States to hold a major political office and the report of the examiner for August 8, 1921, of the department of audits for the State of Ohio contained the following: "Mrs. Faulkner was treasurer during three collection periods covered by this examination. She and her deputies have looked after the collection of delin- quent personal taxes and have been very persistent in sending out notices and
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she has made a record in the collection of delinquent personal taxes which is indeed very commendable and has saved the county a tidy sum of money that might have been paid in collection fees.
(Signed) S. S. Clifton, Examiner.
Mrs. Faulkner supports the Republican party, is active in its work and is a past county chairman of the Republican women's committee. She did an outstanding work as organizer for the Daughters of America, having organized one hundred and eight councils throughout the United States, doing special work of this nature in North and South Carolina, Florida, Georgia, Virginia, West Virginia, Michigan and Illinois, and she also organized the first council in both Los Angeles and Oakland, California. She has member- ship in the Methodist church and she is a past matron of the Eastern Star. a past noble grand of the Rebekahs and past chief of the Pythian Sisters. She deserves much credit for what she has accomplished along these lines and for the zeal, courage and determination she has displayed in everything she has undertaken.
MARY W. GIBSON
MARY W. GIBSON (Mrs. Alfred E.) of 2818 Corydon Road, Cleveland, recently won a joint prize with her husband of $13,941.33 for a 300 page study of commercial arc welding. Following her graduation from University of Denver with a B. A. in chemistry and a Masters of Arts degree, and after her marriage, Mrs. Gibson followed her husband's work, helping him prepare articles for technical journals and addresses for scientific meetings.
They have three children.
MRS. WILLIAM HENRY COLLIER GOODE
MRS. WILLIAM HENRY COLLIER GOODE (Ida Haslup Goode), whose public activity has largely been in connection with church work, was born in Ohio and in her maidenhood was Ida Bingham Haslup. She is a descendant of Hugh Bingham, who came to the United States about 1730, when this country was still numbered among the colonial possessions of Great Britain. He settled in Virginia and his son, Hugh Bingham, Jr., took up his abode in the vicinity of Alexandria, Virginia, where he was living at the time of the Revolutionary War, in which he served as an ensign until American inde- pendence was won. He afterward removed to Chambersburg, Pennsylvania and in that district purchased a farm, on which his remaining days were spent. He married Mary White and family tradition has it that she was a descendant of Preserved White, who came to the new world as one of the passengers on the Mayflower in 1620.
The parents of Mrs. Goode were both natives of Virginia, but spent much of their lives in Maryland, where they were living at the time of their mar-
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riage in 1837. They came to Ohio in 1858, and of their family of seven child- ren-George G., William, Robert B., Mary W., Emma, Ida and Ella, all were born in Maryland but the last two, and with the exception of Mrs. Goode all are now deceased. When the family came to Ohio in 1858 they settled in Sidney where the parents continued to reside until called to their final rest. The father was a manufacturer who first engaged in making plows and after- ward mowers and reapers. The brothers also entered the manufacturing field and were builders of road machinery in Sidney, including scrapers and exca- vators.
Mrs. Goode is a graduate of the Sidney high school and she received her Bachelor of Arts degree from Illinois Wesleyan University, and the honorary degree of Bachelor of Laws from Ohio Wesleyan University. She took up the profession of teaching and prior to her marriage was principal of the Sidney high school for six years and also spent an equal period as high school principal in Pueblo, Colorado.
In more recent years Mrs. Goode has devoted much of her time in a most effective and resultant manner to church work and is now president of the Woman's Home Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal church, while in other branches of the work of the church to which she belongs she has been equally earnest and loyal. She has also done some work for the Republican party and she is now one of the board of one hundred women of the New York Fair.
CAROLINE HEIN
One of the outstanding business women of Cincinnati is CAROLINE HEIN, the secretary of the Cincinnati Street Railway Company, a position she has filled for a decade. A native of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, she attended the grade and high schools of that city and afterward took up the study of stenography. Her first position was in a bank in Pennsylvania. When she was on a visit in Cincinnati in 1923 she learned that Senator James B. Foraker needed a private secretary, applied for the position and was accepted. She continued to serve in that capacity until the death of Senator Foraker and for a year thereafter remained with Mrs. Foraker, acting as her secretary.
When that period had expired she came to the Cincinnati Street Railway Company as secretary to the president and so served until 1929 when she was advanced to her present position as secretary of the company, being one of the few women of the country with similar responsibilities. She has proven an able executive, far-sighted, accurate and systematic in business affairs, and has proven that her promotion was well merited.
Miss Hein takes an active interest in the Cincinnati Business Women's Club, of which she was president from 1933 to 1935. She is also a past presi- dent of the Professional Women's Club and of the Women's City Club. She
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has been particularly helpful in church work, especially in behalf of children and has labored earnestly in the Sunday school. She was chosen chairman of the committee to honor Judge Florence Allen and has figured prominently in connection with many civic affairs. Her leisure hours are largely devoted to good literature and in a review of her record, it is seen that her activities have ever been of a nature that has contributed to the maintenance of higher standards in business and in the lives of individuals, promoting in them a recognition of their duties and responsibilities to others and to society at large.
HELEN PERRY JAMES
HELEN PERRY JAMES, president of the Business and Professional Women's Club of Cleveland, where she has also been well known in educa- tional circles for a number of years, is a native of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and a daughter of Owen and Elizabeth (Evans) James, the former a native of Wales, while the mother was born in Pennsylvania. They spent practically their entire lives in the Keystone state and the father was a Baptist minister.
Rev. and Mrs. James had a family of ten children, as follows: Arthur and Melville, both now deceased; Cleveland, who resides in Philadelphia ; Genevieve, living in Springfield, Illinois; Helen; Dan, who makes his home in Williamsport, Pennsylvania and who is connected with the State highway department ; Margaret, who is the wife of Eugene Gise, of New York City; Gertrude, the wife of James Connor of Merchantsville, New Jersey and who has a daughter, Phillippa; Elizabeth, who is the wife of Gordon Sexton, also of Merchantsville, and who has three children, Gordon, Betty and Ellen; and Dorothy, deceased.
After spending a period as a student in the public schools of Hollidays- burg, Pennsylvania, Helen P. James continued her education at Nashville, Tennessee, then at Titusville, Pennsylvania, and later at Johnstown, Penn- sylvania, until she was graduated from the high school there. She afterward took training for teaching the deaf and is now connected with the Alexander Graham Bell school of Cleveland, a public day school for the deaf, with which she has been associated as an instructor for about eighteen years, doing a splendid and effective work for the pupils under her guidance. This school is located on Fifty-fifth street and the methods there followed embrace the most modern and scientific ideas that have to do with teaching this class of unfortunates.
Since 1922 Miss James has been a member of the Business and Professional Women's Club of Cleveland, formerly served as chairman of some of its committees, was also program chairman for many years, has been its vice president and is now president of this progressive organization. She is also active in the Baptist Church of the Master in Cleveland and is on the board of Christian Education. Her life has reached out along constantly broadening lines of usefulness.
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VIRGINIA KUNKLE JONES
The practical and the artistic seemed to have been most skillfully com- bined in the nature of VIRGINIA KUNKLE JONES as a supplement to that executive ability which she has always displayed in connection with the man- agement of the Golden Lamb Tavern, the historic and interesting old hostelry of Lebanon, which is today the oldest hotel in operation in the state. Built about a century and a quarter ago, it is now conducted by Mr. and Mrs. Robert H. Jones and retains all of the quaintness and the charm of that period. Around it clings the romance and the history of the past and at the same time it meets the requirements of modern day comfort and convenience.
Mrs. Jones who has been active in restoring the old tavern to the style of a hundred years or more ago, was born in Springfield, Ohio, February 14, 1905, a daughter of Judge Albert Henry and Margaret (McCulloch) Kunkle. Her father was a judge of the court of appeals and a prominent representa- tive of Ohio's judiciary. After completing the regular course of study in the Springfield high school, Mrs. Jones attended Wittenberg College, from which she was graduated in 1925, with the Bachelor of Arts degree. She also spent one year at Hollins College. From Springfield she went to Lebanon where she taught school until her marriage to Robert H. Jones, the wedding taking place at Springfield, Ohio in 1928. They now have one daughter, Joan Kunkle Jones, nine years of age. Following her marriage Mrs. Jones became actively associated with her husband in the ownership and management of the famous old Ohio tavern, known as the Golden Lamb. While in college she was intensely interested in home economics and this stood her in good stead when she and her husband entered the hotel business. They both have as their hobby the collecting of native Ohio antiques, which are continually on display at the Golden Lamb and which help give to this unusual tavern its authentic atmosphere. The furnishings of many rooms are in original Ohio antiques.
The story is an interesting one. In 1811 Ichabod Corwin built the hotel, which was conducted under the name of Henry Share's Tavern until 1825. For many years thereafter it was known as the Ohio and Pennsylvania Tavern at the Sign of the Golden Lamb, then became the Bradley House and later the Lebanon House, but it was the present proprietors who had the foresight and the judgment to carry on its ancient traditions and hospitality under the name of the Golden Lamb Tavern. The hotel is a large, rambling brick structure of four stories, with large fireplaces and great chimneys, while a picket fence at the side surrounds a lovely garden. There is still the same old board flooring over which the first guests trod more than one hundred and twenty-four years ago and the old colonial stairways leading to the guest rooms above, while the original dining room is still in use. The rooms are very spacious, many with individual fireplaces, while rag rugs and handwoven carpets cover the floors and the chairs, beds, dressers, corner cupboards. spin- ning wheels and other furnishings reflect the styles of a century or more ago,
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much of the furniture being of that early period. The Golden Lamb has sheltered many famous travelers for on one of the doors of the first landing appears the name of Henry Clay, who on July 15, 1825 stopped here enroute to Washington and was detained by the illness of his little daughter who died here and was laid to rest in a Lebanon cemetery. On the door of an adjoining room is the name of Charles Dickens, who with his wife was enter- tained here April 20, 1842, and still other doors bear the names of John Quincy Adams, Martin Van Buren, William Henry Harrison, Rutherford B. Hayes, James G. Blaine, De Witt Clinton, William McKinley and Warren G. Harding. The Golden Lamb has a charm all its own, reflecting the quiet and contentment of the past, when men were not harassed with the business hurry and unrest of the present. Ofttimes the lines of Longfellow have been quoted relative to this interesting place :
As ancient is this hostelry As any in the land may be. Built in the old colonial day When men lived in a grander way With ampler hospitality.
Mrs. Jones who has done much to restore the Golden Lamb to its pristine glory and charm, is well known in Lebanon and this part of the state. She is a member of Virginia Beta Chapter of Pi Beta Kappa of Hollins College, gives her political support to the Republican party and has membership in the Pres- byterian church, but her activity largely centers in the old tavern opened by Ichabod Corwin a hundred and twenty-four years ago and which is today rich in its memories of the golden past.
VERONICA CATHERINE KELLEY
VERONICA CATHERINE KELLEY, residing in Galion, is a well known representative of the business activity of Crawford County, being secretary and treasurer of the Kelley Manufacturing Corporation of Bucyrus, the duties of which position she assumed in 1918. She is also prominent in art and drama circles in Galion, where she has spent her entire life. She is a daughter of Thomas F. and Nellie Mary (Baggs) Kelley, the former born in England in 1869 and the latter in Marion, Ohio in 1876. Her father is the originator of the metal burial vault industry, his first vault having been built in 1905 in a small shop in the back of his home in Galion, since which time the business has been developed until it is now an extensive enterprise.
His daughter Veronica attended the Marion High School and was grad- uated from St. Mary of the Springs College at Columbus, Ohio, in 1918. winning her diploma in elocution with her presentation of "Just David" and "Peg o' my Heart" in which she played all the parts. With her return home she became the active assistant of her father in the Kelley Manufacturing Corporation of Bucyrus, of which she was made secretary and treasurer.
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This company manufactures the metal burial vaults brought out by her father, and since July, 1938, Miss Kelley has been conducting the business unaided, owing to the illness of her father. As manager, she directs the activities of six salesmen who cover the entire country. She is one of the few women buyers of steel in the United States, this requiring a highly technical knowledge of the subject. She also has full charge of the fabrication and purchases all other materials used by the concern, and, as well, manages the office.
Since leaving the classroom Miss Kelley has never ceased to feel a keen interest and delight in drama, literature and music. She was president of the Galion Study Club in 1936, after having served as its secretary in 1935, and she is a member of The Drama Workshop of Galion and is chairman of the music committee of the Galion Business & Professional Women's Club. Her interests, outside of business, center in drama and literature and she frequently reviews books for the Study Club.
NORMA KLANKE
NORMA KLANKE, secretary-treasurer of the Ohio and Valley Bus Line, was born in Cincinnati, one of a family of six children. Her financial assist- ance was needed early in life due to the sudden death of her father. After completing grade school, she managed one year at Woodward High School, when her family had to have help. So she found employment with one of the local factories, sewing. Norma Klanke did not intend, however, to sew for a living. She immediately started to East Night High School, taking short- hand and bookkeeping, during which time she was successful in obtaining a position with a local automobile agency as stenographer. Presently Norma took over the bookkeeping for this company and ten years later she had charge of the office. The position paid her $3.50 per week to start. She was earning $25.00 per week at the time she left. Norma's next job paid her $40.00 per week; the next $50.00.
When most people still thought the auto bus was just a passing fancy, its chances looked good to Norma Klanke. By this time she had obtained a certificate in accounting at the University of Cincinnati, she understood finance and was willing to accept responsibility.
So she joined up with a bus business started with seven coaches. Today they travel thousands and thousands of miles, operating 70 coaches and use a million gallons of gas every year.
It was hard work, long hours and sometime very discouraging but Miss Klanke believes in seeing things through. And she did. For ten years she has taken courses at the University of Cincinnati. In addition to accounting, finance and English, she has taken commercial law, speaking courses, tax courses as well as numerous other subjects; in fact, she is still studying at U. C. "When we stop learning, we stop growing," says Norma Klanke.
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Miss Klanke is one of the leaders of the Cincinnati Business and Pro- fessional Women's Club and in the national organization as well. She be- longs to the Cincinnati Woman's Rotary Club, to the National Association of Cost Accountants. She has even found time to help in the social service given by her church, to teach in the Sunday School.
She lives with her mother in the old family homestead, from which on the sudden death of her father, she started out to find work-at 14 years of age.
"Employment can be found," says Norma Klanke-"But education and training must be worked for."
ANNA MILLER KNOTE
ANNA MILLER KNOTE, national executive secretary of Alpha Xi Delta and editor of its magazine, published under the same name. has likewise been national president of the society and is equally well known because of her former activity as an educator. She is a resident of Mansfield, Ohio, in which she was born, a daughter of Charles H. and Katherine Ann (Krouse) Knote. Her father, a native of Switzerland, became a resident of Mansfield in young manhood and for many years was with the old Altman-Taylor Company of this city. His daughter is a graduate of the Mansfield High School and also of Wittenberg College, after which she engaged in teaching Latin and Greek for four years. She then entered Columbia University, where she received her Bachelor of Arts degree, after pursuing her studies there from 1918 to 1922. She then began teaching modern and European history in the Mansfield High School.
Her recognized ability led to her selection for the position of national executive secretary of the Alpha Xi Delta, and she has also been national vice president and national president of the society from 1922 to 1938, while at the present writing she is also editor of the Alpha Xi Delta magazine. In her position as executive secretary she has visited approximately one hundred colleges in every state in the Union, attending conferences and making speeches to the local organizations, and much of the distance from point to point she has covered in her own car, being an enthusiastic motorist.
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